The lowdown on Real Sociedad

Real Sociedad are Barça's first opponents of the new league season this Sunday at 8.00pm CEST. Here’s the lowdown on the team that finished fifth in La Liga last season. 

Where are they from?

San Sebastián (Donostia in the Basque language) is a beautiful city on the north coast of the Iberian Peninsula, in the Basque Country and just 20 km from the French border. It’s relatively small, with a wonderful old district and spectacular scenery overlooking La Concha bay, making it a very popular place to take a city break.

The club

One such visitor was King Alfonso XIII, who used to stay in the city every summer, which is how the ‘Sociedad de Futbol’ (Football Society) came to be called the ‘Real Sociedad’ (Royal Society) in 1909.

The club is now well-established as a regular feature of la Liga, but its truly golden years were 1981 and 1982, when they won back-to-back league titles. Such success has never been repeated, although they have finished second three times since, most recently in 2003.

The cities of San Sebastian and Bilbao have always enjoyed a healthy rivalry, and that means their football clubs too. Like Athletic, Real once operated a Basque-only policy, but broke that tradition in 1989 when John Aldridge became their first foreign import.

Incidentally, when you hear Spaniards speak of ‘La Real’, they mean Real Sociedad. ‘El Real’, using the masculine, typically means Real Madrid.

Head to head

Barça have won a staggering 23 games in a row at home to the Basques, keeping clean sheets in 13 of them.

The sides met in December in a rearranged fixture in La Liga at Camp Nou and despite La Real taking the lead through Willian José's effort, goals from Jordi Alba and Frenkie de Jong ensured Barça's amazing streak against the Basques at home continued.

It’s not been quite the same story when the sides have played in San Sebastián. From 2010 to 2016, Barça went for seven games without a win, although in the last meeting at Anoeta, they cruised to a 6-1 victory.

The teams also met in the Spanish Super Cup semi-final in January. The game ended 1-1 (Frenkie de Jong scoring Barça’s goal) but Barça took the game on penalties.

Form guide

Real were the surprise leaders for several weeks of the 2020/21 season, but they eventually slid out of the Champions League positions and ended up having to settle for a Europa League berth.

They did, however, get their celebrate their third Copa del Rey title, beating local rivals Athletic Club in the final, although they were only champions for a fortnight. The game was actually the 2019/20 final, which was delayed by almost a year due to Covid-19. 

The players

International caps: David Silva (Spain, 125); Mathew Ryan (Australia, 60), Alexander Isak (Sweden, 26); Nacho Monreal (Spain, 22); Mikel Oyarzabal (Spain, 19); Adnan Januzaj (Belgium, 13); Mikel Merino (Spain, 6); Asier Illarramendi (Spain, 3); Kévin Rodrigues (Portugal, 3)

Top scorers 2020/21 (all competitions): Alexander Isak (17), Mikel Oyarzabal (13), Portu (9)

New signings 2021/22: Other than players returning from loan, the only new signing Real have made is experienced Australian goalkeeper Mat Ryan (Brighton and Hove Albion).

Barça connections: The links between Barça and Real have traditionally been close and a number of top players have defended the colours of both clubs over the years. These have included legendary 1970s goalkeeper Mikel Urrutikoetxea, ‘Dream Team’ era heroes Jose Mari Bakero, Txiki Beguiristain, Jon Andoni Goikoetxea and Bosnian Meho Kodro, and more recently Chilean goalkeeper Claudio Bravo. The tradition is being continued by Antoine Griezmann, who joined Real at the age of 14 and went on to play 180 games for the first team between 2009 and 2014.

The manager

A right back for the club in the nineties, Imanol Alguacil is Real Sociedad through and through. He has been part of its coaching setup for the best part of the last decade. After Asier Garitano was fired in December 2018, he took command of the first team (having previously already done so temporarily after Eusebio Sacristán had been dismissed).